


before & after

by 101places



Series: trauma days [3]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Angst, Dissociation, F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Jemma Simmons-centric, Post-Episode: s01e06 FZZT, Post-Episode: s03e10 Maveth, Post-Season/Series 01, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, not Grant Ward friendly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-06
Updated: 2019-01-06
Packaged: 2019-10-05 07:52:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,392
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17320973
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/101places/pseuds/101places
Summary: 'You've been watching him?''Every day before I left, every day since I got back.'Simmons life is characterised as 'befores' and 'afters', and it doesn't seem that anything she does can stop that.( AKA: Jemma Simmons has PTSD & in this essay I will, )





	before & after

**Author's Note:**

> this just started because i got annoyed at people not acknowledging simmons ptsd & also because that quote in the summary just Screams hypervigilance to me
> 
> i might write something else about these two bc as A Whole PTSD exploring it is p cathartic to me but who knows! we'll see!
> 
> also re: the relationship tags: if you read this as biospec i will reach through the screen and Eat You, this is about the trauma that ward gives to simmons & is in no way positive. & while there Is some fitzsimmons its just at the end, the focus of this is simmons
> 
> ALSO last note: its 6am any mistakes are my own im tired thank u
> 
> as always leave kudos & comments if you like what i write!

There were a lot of ‘before’s and ‘after’s in Simmons’ life. Before she earned her PhD, and after. Before she attended the Academy, and after. Before she met Fitz, and after. Before they lived on the Bus, and after. Before the Chitauri virus...

And after.

Adjusting to the after was always difficult.

When she was younger, Simmons had tried to be optimistic. Instead of letting what she was leaving behind her overwhelm her, she’d let herself look forwards to what the future held. She had faith that tomorrow would be more exciting, fascinating- _better_. But as she grew older, she discovered that wasn’t always the case.

The days after the virus she had difficulty sleeping, and glancing out of the window of the plane in flight made her feel rather nauseous. She had given looking for a silver lining some real effort, but nothing stuck.

‘ _I discovered a previously unknown alien virus!_ ’ But she also nearly died. ‘ _I developed an anti-serum to counter-act the effects of the alien virus!_ ’ But she also nearly **died**.

No silver lining managed to settle without that cruel reminder bursting to the front of her mind, and it seemed that the more she tried to force it away, the harder it clung on, leaving her with fresh panic in her chest as images of free-falling through the air plagued her.

One night, when everyone else was asleep, she sat at the bar alone. It had been weeks since the virus and she’d noted that she was beginning to panic a bit less at the thought of it all, but some nights were worse than others, and this one was proving to be one of the more unpleasant ones.

Then, there were footsteps.

Quiet, but loud enough to be heard. The type of footsteps that Simmons had begun to recognise while living with spies- the cautious kind, where they wanted you to be aware of their presence, but didn’t want to startle you. The kind that were more like a silent question than anything, asking if you minded their company.

And Simmons didn’t mind. Not really. How could she mind the company of the person who had ensured that she hadn’t died?

She shifted to make room for him, and he walked closer, but didn’t take the seat. That was about what she’d grown to expect from him.

“You’re up late.” His tone was always difficult to decipher. One part concern, one part suspicion, other parts… something else. That’s a specialist for you, she reasoned.

“I nearly died.” The words slipped out without permission, and Simmons was quick to blame it on her exhaustion. Realising that with recent events that probably wouldn’t be specific enough, she expanded: “The virus. The ocean. It was all so close.”

He was silent for a few moments. “...But you didn’t die.”

“No, I didn’t,” She agreed, “But I _nearly_ did. If one thing had happened differently, I would have. If I had jumped sooner, if no one came to the lab, if there was no parachute, if the anti-serum hadn’t worked. It was too close.”

“That’s life in the field.” He wasn’t trying to be unkind, Simmons knew that, but she couldn’t help but feel that her concerns were being swept aside. She pressed her lips together tightly, unwilling to speak about this further.

Further silence settled between them, before he sighed. “...But that’s why I’m here. To keep you non-combat operatives safe. So if anything like that happens in the future, I’ll be there there to make sure nothing hurts you. You don’t have anything to worry about.”

Surprised by his out of character sincerity, Simmons looked up at him and smiled gently. “Thank you, Ward.”

 

.

 

Before and after. The pod had to be the biggest before and after of Simmons life- she couldn’t imagine how anything could have a more profound impact on her than this.

Everyone talked and talked about how Fitz would never be the same again, but all she wanted to do was scream, because couldn’t they see it? None of them would be the same again. Nothing would be the same again. Everything that they had grown used to had been violently uprooted, and no matter how hard anyone tried, there would be no returning to that idealistic before.

Fitz found it difficult to string sentences together. He couldn’t remember basic words, or old memories, or name, or faces. His connections would become sharper, with time, Simmons was told (and had researched for herself), but today there was no sign of that. His hand shook almost constantly, and blunt comments seemed to leave him with abandon whenever she was in the room. But he had a brain injury because of her, so she couldn’t find it in herself to blame him.

Coulson clung to the institution of the past, obsessing over the scramble for resources. Trying to save information, weapons, people. He wasn’t the same small authority figure that he had been. Now he was the director of SHIELD, and he had no time for individual agents concerns. But he had so much responsibility on his shoulders now, so she couldn’t find it in herself to blame him.

Skye, May and Triplett seemed much the same, and they were who Simmons chose to spend the majority of her time with, but the more time she spent with them the more obvious it became that even here, things couldn’t be as they were before.

If those three hadn’t changed, then Simmons had, and the disconnect that change brought didn’t go unnoticed by her.

In the end, she didn’t mean to push them away, but her work was important. Her work brought her structure, focus. As everything else in her life changed and fell into chaos around her, the science remained the same.

 

.

 

His routine was the same every day. Even without a clock, he always woke at the same time, and went through the same activities.

Change was distressing Simmons and taking over her whole world, yet how unchanged Ward seemed was even more distressing.

Every move he made was the same. Repetitive. Robotic. There had to be a reason for it. He had to be planning something.

So she watched him, every day. After returning to her monitor after being away she replayed the footage she’d missed on fast-forwards, making sure she hadn’t missed anything important, and her routine quickly began to mirror his.

Even though that man was in a cell with no way out, intrusive thoughts of him refused to leave her mind. Thoughts of him escaping, of him killing every single one of them or worse. Unlike her thoughts after the pod, they didn’t lessen over time- if anything, they grew wilder, over-taking everything else.

The ache of anxiety in her chest became her ‘normal’, and the thoughts that roared through her mind were so loud that sometimes she felt shocked that no one else could hear them.

 

.

 

Today, his movements broke routine, yet as he began to act off-script she found herself frozen to the spot.

She didn’t know who had left him paper. She hadn’t taken the time to learn the names of the new agents around the base (stupid, stupid. she should have learnt. there was no excuse for her lapse of judgement), but regardless, he had fashioned the slither of paper into a weapon.

All Simmons could do was watch as his blood spilled.

 

.

 

Anxiety thrummed through her veins faster than she could ever recall, but somehow she managed to prevent her carefully constructed mask of functionality from crumbling as she stepped into his cell.

He was injured, and he had no weapons. She had a pair of armed guards standing out of his reach. But even though all the precautions had been taken to ensure her safety, all she could think as she closed the space between them was how easily he could kill her.

He was a specialist. It’s what he was trained to do. He could kill her with his bare hands before her guards were given a chance to react, or he could take her as a hostage and try to bargain for his freedom. The act of self harm was most likely a ploy to get someone to come close enough for him to spring a trap, and here she was, walking like a lamb into the slaughter.

But she couldn’t let him bleed out.

She had assured Coulson that she would be able to handle this. She had assured him that she wouldn’t let their golden goose- their host of HYDRA intel- slip away. This was her job. No matter how much she wanted him to just die already, she couldn’t let that happen.

So without a word, she got to work.

“I didn’t realise you’d be the one to fix me up,” To her absolute disgust, he was smiling. “But it’s a pleasant surprise. I’m glad to see that you’re alright.”

She pulled the bandage around his wrist significantly tighter than was necessary, enjoying his barely noticeable wince. It was hardly enough to satisfy her after everything he had done to her and the people that she loved, but it was a start.

He didn’t speak up again after that.

 

.

 

Later that day, she found herself washing her hands.

She knew that they were clean. She had properly sanitised them after she had finished treating him. They were definitely clean, there wasn’t a trace of anything on them, but the feeling of his blood, of _her_ blood, of just- _blood_ refused to fade, so she kept scrubbing until she could barely even feel anything.

 

.

 

The concept of before and after was beginning to feel like a joke to Simmons- there were just so many befores.

Before the virus. Before HYDRA. Before the pod. Before the city. Before Maveth.

How many more befores would she live to see? How much worse could her life get? How many more times could the rug be pulled from under her feet? How long would it be until she could finally settle in an after and begin to build some narrative of a beautiful future?

How long, after she reached that point, would it take for someone to come running in and bring it all crashing down around her again?

 

.

 

The world was numb, and Simmons stood in front of an empty cell.

Befores and afters all mixed together, and she couldn’t tell which was which. Distantly, she thought to ground herself in the moment, but she was finding it difficult to recognise what that was, too.

She remembered kneeling on the other side of that cell once, with blood all around her, saving the life of a man that she wanted nothing more than to kill. A man who she hated. A man who terrified her. A man who was dead now.

Simmons had never been one to believe in ghosts. They were all hallucinations, or delusions, or some other explainable scientific phenomena, but she was beginning to believe in hauntings, because even though she had been assured over and over that man was dead and gone, she still felt his influence around her, suffocating the air from her lungs.

She hugged her arms around her, wincing as they pressed into injuries that were only beginning to heal.

A long time ago, she’d found comfort in that man, going so far as to consider him a friend. Then she found out who he really was. That man was not a good person. No matter his excuses, he had hurt too many people, and she hated him with everything in her. He was dead, and she was too numb to feel much of anything right now, but she thought that she was glad.

She just wished that her memories of him could have died with him, but life couldn’t be that merciful, because all she could hear echoing through her skull was, “I would never hurt you.”

Gradually, Simmons came to realise that she had sunk to the ground at some point over the last few minutes, and the heat on her cheeks signalled that she’d been crying. As her awareness of the present moment began to return, she made note of the tightness in her chest, aching of her stomach, and build-up of terrified energy throughout her body.

Heavy footsteps crashed on the stairs towards her, and Simmons haltingly looked towards the source of them.

Fitz stood there, looking rather out of breath himself. Numbly, Simmons wondered if he’d been running.

“There you are!” He didn’t try to disguise the anxious edge to his voice. He rushed over to her, then stopped a few feet away, as if he was worried that stepping into her personal space would break her into a thousand pieces. “Jem…”

“I’m fine.” She answered his unasked question easily, not quite understanding why her voice sounded so small and shaky.

He shifted on the spot, looking to the empty cell. He didn’t seem to be in a good state himself, and she was about to ask him what was wrong, before he sat down on the ground beside her, still keeping that distance between them.

Simmons looked up at him. She thought she should smile, maybe, but found that the muscles in her face weren’t up for following her orders. Instead, she shifted closer to him and dropped her head onto his shoulder.

He hesitated, and though they were most assuredly not psychically connected, she thought that she could practically hear him debating how he was supposed to respond to this. In the end, he chose to bring his arm up and wrap it around her, holding her close to his side, careful not to disturb her injuries.

Untangling the befores and afters was a difficult task. The future coloured the past as much as the past coloured the future. The concept of time wasn’t easy to grasp, especially for a scientist experiencing a rather intense dissociative episode, but as Simmons counted the rises and falls of Fitz’s chest, she decided that she didn’t need to care about them.

Befores and afters would come whether she wanted them to or not. Some of them would be pleasant, some of them unpleasant, and there was nothing she could do to change that. The only thing that she could control was this present moment.


End file.
